


The Right Type

by Miraphina Atherton (mew_tsubaki)



Category: NCIS
Genre: M/M, when B's brothers cornered them this was all i could think about XD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-01
Updated: 2019-10-01
Packaged: 2020-11-08 15:40:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20837957
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mew_tsubaki/pseuds/Miraphina%20Atherton
Summary: Torres and Reeves reconvene after fending off questions from Bishop's brothers, since the trio couldn't be further from the truth about their sister's love life.





	The Right Type

**Author's Note:**

> The NCIS characters belong to Donald P. Bellasario, not to me. Rehashing why Reeves and Torres insisted to Bishop's brothers that neither of them was dating her. ;} Read, review, and enjoy!

"You and I need to have a little chat."

Unsurprisingly, Torres rolled his eyes. He even scoffed, the bugger. "What did I do _now_?"

Reeves wanted to point out Torres' guilty conscience—the American was constantly in trouble with any of the lot of them, so it was no shock that that was his reaction to Reeves' words. "Bishop's brothers," Reeves griped.

"Oh." Despite the tiny exclamation, Reeves caught a glimpse of Torres' impish grin as they left the bank with copies of the account details the late Commander Reza had requested shortly before his untimely demise.

"Yeah. 'Oh,'" Reeves echoed. He gripped the steering wheel. "I'm not even certain where to start."

Torres' grin turned less impish and more cute as he cocked his head at Reeves. "You could start by driving the speed limit, Grandma," he teased.

"I'm driving like a sane person, Nick. It's not my fault you Yanks don't know how to drive—let alone on which side of the road." He left it at that, because a tiny part of him agreed with his fellow agent, but Reeves couldn't help it. He'd had the past half a year to get acclimated to driving in the States, and still it mystified him.

"All right, jokes aside, lemme have it."

"How humble of you."

"Clayton." At a red light, he stared at Reeves with raised eyebrows.

Reeves frowned. He tore his eyes away as the light changed green. "You really did throw me to the wolves there."

"As you said, almost word for word, in the bullpen earlier. I thought Quinn was gonna scream at us if we didn't take it elsewhere."

"Hence my dragging you along to the bank." Reeves heaved a sigh. "You're a cheeky little thing, you know that?"

Torres was back to smiling, though, with another glance at him, Reeves saw Torres twiddling his fingers in his lap.

"…you caught me off-guard," he said at last.

"Sorry."

"None of that stuff at the office."

"Well…"

Reeves lingered at a stop sign on a one-way road. "You can't be serious. You want to change the very bloody rules _you_ yourself set?"

Now Torres was nervous. Reeves only ever saw him scratch the side of his neck and roll his head around when he was floundering for words. "Uh…"

They were only five, maybe ten minutes from the naval base. Reeves detoured onto a side street and parked in the first available space. Then he turned the car off, leaned on the steering wheel, and cupped his cheek in his palm. He aimed an unimpressed look at Torres. "Nick."

"Clayton."

"Out with it."

Torres shrugged, but it was the shrug of a child knowingly in trouble, not that of someone simply trying to brush things off. "They—were making me nervous."

"They're civilians, Nick."

"There are _three_ of them, man. And only one of me!" Now he glared at Reeves, grumpy as he waggled his index finger in front of his face.

Reeves bit back a laugh and a smirk. "You're intimidated by the numbers?"

"No, but—" He ran his hand over his face and groaned. "It makes me a little nervous, knowing how everyone's so determined to discover Bishop's mysterious boyfriend. They're lovable, but they're nosy."

"…ah." Now Reeves knew where he was headed.

"Hard not to oversell things and throw suspicions elsewhere when you've got a mysterious boyfriend yourself."

Reeves pursed his lips. "…good point." Suddenly the car felt quite small and warm. Of course it was chilly outside, but Reeves had a fresh desire to slip his scarf off right now.

Torres fidgeted in the passenger seat, as well. "Quinn's pretty eagle-eyed about this stuff, too. When Bishop and I showed up at the crime scene the other night, me dressed to the nines and Bishop a solid seven—l"

Reeves snorted. Only Torres would include such a detail.

"—she assumed Bishop and I had been on a date. Like, together. _Together_-together." He groaned again. "And I was quick to reply that I hadn't been on date with _her_."

"And Quinn didn't push?"

"Thankfully, all attention was on Bishop before Bishop refocused on the case."

Reeves nodded and took a breath. He hadn't realized how he'd tensed up at Torres' anecdote, so he tried to relax back into the driver's seat. "…I see," he eventually said. He concentrated and wended his way back to their original train of thought. "But what about you being all handsy with me at the office? In front of those three, no less."

"I wasn't being _handsy_—"

"Nick, you had your hand on my arm for longer than four seconds. And, as you so elegantly shoved me into the elevator with them, your hand was on my lower back. Any lower, and it'd have been right on my bum." He raised his eyebrows at the other man.

Torres shot him a look. "…okay, so maybe I broke my rule about being touchy-feely at work, but it was for a good reason! And I really was happy to see your stupid face."

"Stupidly handsome," Reeves quipped.

"Yeah, sure." Torres scratched his ear. "I mean, it wasn't all bad, right? We're both clean. We're both t—" He stopped short and cleared his throat. He had a new interest in watching whatever was in his wing mirror.

Reeves…didn't blame him. He could guess the sentence—"We're both taken"—and he felt similarly about it. Based on Bishop's happy behavior, she'd probably been seeing her mystery beau far longer than Reeves and Torres had been seeing each other, which made sense. Bishop was more mature than either of them, Reeves knew, and he and Torres had had too much fun with the flirty banter to stop and realize sooner that maybe the flirtations meant something. So they were still rather new to this relationship, and both were new to the idea of having a partner that understood the same difficulties of doing their work while keeping their options—female and male—open.

Regardless of how new their relationship was, there was just no outing themselves, if they could help it. That came with its own headaches.

"I know you didn't talk rubbish about me," he stated. His words had the desired effect: They pulled Torres out of some momentary stiffness.

"'Course not."

Reeves smiled. "They told me what you said, you know."

"…ah."

"Let's see—'tall, British, tailored suit.'" Reeves shrugged. "That's just factual." His smile morphed into a wolfish grin. "It's the 'pretty-ass jawline' I keep coming back to."

"Just stating the facts," Torres assured him, but he did reach over and pat Reeves' jaw for good measure.

"But I _was_ stuck in that elevator with them for far too long, luv," Reeves pointed out. He turned the car back on and checked before pulling out onto the road. "Good God, all three of them—George, John, and Robert. She has three brothers too many. I like her, but…I'll be happy when they return home after the holiday."

"About that—I think I overheard one of them say they were staying through the holiday."

Just lovely. Reeves frowned. "I can't handle any more of Robert translating my Queen's English for the other two."

"They won't be here forever," Torres said. "And think of it as divine punishment."

Reeves turned back to town. "Divine punishment? For _what_?"

"For all the flirting you did with Bishop during this case."

He had a retort readied and aimed_—"I'm bi, not a bigamist, Nick"_—but he was happy to catch the hint of color on the other man's cheek as Torres faced out the window. Up until now, it'd been strictly casual with them, and, though seeing others hadn't been discussed, the possibility hadn't been ruled out.

To hear Nick Torres, infamous ladies' man and well-known flirt, imply that he wanted someone to be his and his _alone_… Reeves consciously had to keep his jaw from dropping. So he smiled to himself instead.

"I truly was distraught when you tossed me in there with nothing but a 'good luck' and a pat on the back," he remarked.

"So you've said," Torres huffed. "For the umpteenth time."

"The occasional pat on the rump would be acceptable and more encouraging or reassuring, you know."

Torres glared at him, but the color in his cheeks gave him away.

Reeves pulled into a space across the street from a café and pointed to it. "But you're cute either way, and you _did_ save my life today, so let's have lunch, yeah?"

His fellow agent—was it too soon to think of him as his boyfriend? Agh, they'd have to discuss that another time—was taken aback. It took him a second to regain his mental footing, and he grinned his typical cocky Torres grin. "That's right. I'm still your hero, baby."

Reeves sighed as they exited the car, and he squinted at Torres in the sunlight. "Perhaps. But you also insisted I'm a 'big boy' who can handle myself. And, as I recall," he continued, leaning over Torres, "I never did get your answer about whether you want a demonstration of my being a…big boy."

Torres narrowed his eyes at him, but he didn't back down as he stared up at the taller man. "…there _is_ a long holiday weekend coming up…"

"Sounds like a nice weekend to stay indoors, have a few romantic dinners and such." Reeves left it at that, though he couldn't help but chuckle at the redder Torres got as the ideas so clearly ran through his mind—Reeves could see it in the way Torres' dark eyes flickered—and he removed his scarf to bundle Torres up…before silently slipping his hand into Torres' as the crossed the street.

And either Torres didn't notice—or he was just as happy for them to have this moment to themselves.

**Author's Note:**

> X3 I'M—! 8D So, this summer, I've been writing a lot of Ellick and Clellick (bc OT3!) and I've had this idea for a while, but I needed the time to rewatch the s14e8, "Enemy Combatant," bc I needed to watch it with ship goggles on. And I was not disappointed. XD I took so many notes on all the little interactions between Nick and Clayton, and I found myself laughing harder and enjoying the episode more, tbh. (Like, honestly, I could write an analysis of that episode, *LOL*.) There are a lot of little canon things between the boys that just make me smile, and I'll prolly be writing about those, too, in other stories. Plus, since I liked Bishop with Qasim, Reeves with Torres also rly works? Again, it just makes this episode funnier to read when you consider Torres throws his boyfriend into the awkward situation; regardless, Bishop's brothers were wrong about Torres' and Reeves' type…since they have each other. ;) AH! Which reminds me: Writing Clellick or Click (jfc what a perf ship name :3), I've always hc'd Reeves and Torres being bi bc they've got some serious vibes. And that was another detail I enjoyed writing Reeves contemplating, bc jfc the funniest and yet most tiresome thing to explain to your loved ones is that being bisexual doesn't mean you're not monogamous. Oof.
> 
> Thanks for reading, and please review! Check out my other NCIS fics if you liked this.
> 
> -mew-tsubaki :3c


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